Oke’s Musings: Poetry, People and Places

Author: Oke Iroegbu

  • My Muse: The Sun

    Why the sun travels with me I do not know, Trying to hide from her prove futile each time Yet I miss the warmth when it is dark and evening The gold upon the clouds are her handiwork The dust smeared greens are her art piece The tree leaves fall gayly, quietly on the winds…

  • the tryst

    “Come my tryst, come my lover…” I made you my love, and it come in form of a rare bead Which you wear in the heart of your hearts Where memories fall and rise, play and replay in ecstacy My own joy is not built upon your beautiful face, I am graced to have a…

  • Lafia

    Dusts, sand, white clouds and falcons Hawkers, sellers, buyers and people I see the grin on your face, One print of queer grace When you say ‘Sanu*…’ ‘And how do you do?’ The days are hot here So we try to walk bare Chilled water feel our gullet And to some balance we set The…

  • I am Nigeria

    You have smiles on your face Reminds me of my beloved siblings No need to see you thru your race You are you; one, unique and winning Igbo kwenu! Kedu, olee, how do you do? Come in, have a sit, taste this dish You come in peace, we surely know To you, all good things…

  • sunset, evening

    Clouds gather above Casting shadowy troves Red skies like the wine An evening, a pretty sign The lonely tree stand at ease Like a fiery dog free of her leash She swerves with the clouds songs She enjoys the love, the attention The hills grow up to meet the sun Shades grow behind huts and…

  • muse: act now

    See the leaves fall before our eyes While the chimneys puff our smoke Should they all fall before we see? The wind blow hotter airs And the sharks sail closer to us Are they scared or want food? The snail shells are broken They sleep longer, they die earlier Soon the butterflies and bees vanish…

  • Merry Christmas

    This is the season of love Let the season bring you a load of Heavens goodness Let happiness and smiles accompany your blessedness I wish you all a merry christmas and a prosperous new year

  • Muse: Under the Guava

    The Guava sheds our little playground from the scorching sun The flowers fall on our heads and gave the look of a fine bride There is a family of brown green mantis on the leaves of the Guava Savoring the sweet fragrance of the flower and the open air The Guava is our citadel, it…

  • These Times of the Year…

    We have smiled We have loved We have done all needed to be done And the last fruits of harvest were sown The harmattan is yet to come after all But the brown clay has repainted the walls Hot is the heat of the sun on the laborers back But to his grain stores he…

  • Spare Poem

    I fall back to my bed, each night with hope on my breast Twinkle became the blinking of stars up the skies When the cold that burn all peoples chunk of fat And the sight of the solemn clouds are manna to the eyes The grim colors of the falling darkness gather Moths, ants, earwigs,…

  • An Evening of ‘Colorful’ Airs

    Sweet and wonderful are smell of dry air in the breezy and solitary open LIke that of bread soaked in margarine, quasi burned in the oven The taste is remindful of romantic acquiantances hewn to fields of Roses Stretched afar, to where the lands open to other lands of colors and scents The fineness of…

  • Welcome December

    It’s the month of icing cold The freezing of whole rivers and circular fall of tree leaves When the sun rise higher in the clouds The lands glow with her amazing heat The cold and heat; Decembers hallmark

  • A muse: Star Light

    Star light But thousand miles away from home They glitter still with their amazing innocence Come on, dear glittering stars… You wouldn’t know I am not at home, would you? There are many glittering stars out tonight Out they come, like a parade of great might Come behold this exotic and pretty sight Made from…

  • A painting of a hill on the Snows plague

    Paint a land where crisscrossing figures fall before hungry happy eyes Tell of place where the skies see seizures without which there are no sighs Cut the soil, cut some mud Mold the mud into some hill Place the hill on the cut soil And watch a quiet town Grow beneath the hills shelter Cut…

  • Fireflies

    Twinkle… There are wings on the air On a dark, very dark night Twinkle… But the wings move from their lairs Glowing colors hued black and white Twinkle… The appearance seldom come so rare Twinkling into the gravely dark night Twinkle… The night is cold and dark, the night is bare But if you watch,…

  • The Wind

    You walk against the fast wind, your hair fall beside your haste Down it rolls, flowing with the strong wind down your waist All these while the swift wind and your fine hair go about their romance

  • First Words of P’Ville, SummerTown 2

                                                Summer had a lake which shone with the sun light The shivering of the waters were seen even in the nights By the roadside were carts drove were green and yellow flowers And at…

  • Musing: Setting sun

    1. The setting sun reminds me of many things Some nice, some exciting, some make me laugh And others leave me sobbing at the thought But making me to laugh or leaving me to sob I find times defined in those memories, not me   2. Twilight comes with even finer airs, playing On fantasies that…

  • When we play with the wor(l)ds

    Let us say there are some mystery in the Earths misery Fake hysteria overshadow Natures artless history Yet with the blazing sun come our sober pun Savaging the dying Earth: stay or run, but we cant run And when we look to the South, there is strive To the helpless North, there is a hungry drought;…

  • Musing: Halved, the Legend

    1 Now I write you a piece of my heart tonight In the growing Harmattan and her temperament I am cut in two- I am halved in your Providence One for your happiness, another for Your happiness 2 This piece of heart tells a tale of the sea folk a story of survival, a war…

  • Draw the Sun

    Draw the sun and paint your dreams Believe in the little you do, hope for the best Connect to your mind, live your dream!

  • Faded

    Nothing compares to speeches made by the eyes When fine memories tumble into low faint sighs Now see our glamour fade before the waking morning With the old tree, where we played sitting and grinning Mourning the demise of a union which might not be Or which was but could not be totally seen

  • First Words of P’Ville, SummerTown

    When the Winter Witch got tired of the warmth Which the fine golden sun brought She decided to leave the sunny, pitiful city And with her she took all her trinkets and jewellery Then she would stare across the vast wild Oat fields And all she saw was melting ice and she always sighed In…

  • The Messenger

    Originally posted on Oke’s Musings: Poetry, People and Places: Kokookoroko kokorokoro A greeting called from afar The children ran out excited As if the message was for them But then who knows? Heads up, listen attentively Komkom korookom Another beat rang out Pushing the mild hit Into the ears of even the heaviest village sleeper…

  • A Haiku: Pepper Crags

    The world sat on pepper crags The pain that came and went Hunt the rest that sat beside her

  • Welcoming November, with Love

    There is this month which gave good memories It brings hope, joy and consolation And expectations grow when the month arrives The moments are like mixed gold dusts Falling from eyes, distorted, unified, in-explainable A desire to see it come and go and so on… It tells of the way we have gone since the year…

  • Africa: Retelling the story

    What if there was no love in me for you Africa…? I shrug, I will not think of it… I wonder which other songs are left for me to sing I wonder what can give me much joy for a better future And I thank God for this gift, for Africa, for the world For…

  • The Butterfly

    See Mother Nature’s art See her paintings, black and white Behold the gift of the rising sun, The wind is a prize to be won So fly, pet of the blue clouds … skies and the wind Break forth from the cocoon Hit the silky walls wide open Fly away, you pretty butterfly Travel farther…

  • Let us take a Walk

     Now let us take a walk through the pine forest Through the shed which the forest provides Through the pathway where the leaves form a cushion Through the place where the squirrels make an abode And the darkness of the shrubs a shed from the noon Come let us take a walk through the lands…

  • The Tree leaves fall

    Permit me a sec before reading this piece. I am pained to see the world destroy green life, I feel the grieve of these wonderful creatures, I feel even worse knowing I might not be able to save all the trees from the cruelty of my own kind. You all know that the trees are…

  • A muse: The Thunder and her nephew

    When the thunder storm descends The clouds rumble with a quake, For the Earth and her companions She cuts up a powerful link Letting her much younger nephew Take a solid images of the quiet world Every other force goes on pause, on mute While the two siblings enjoy their ride Through the Earth, through…

  • Amuse: Listen

    Listen, listen… For I am about to make a poem Of what you may ask? I do not know…

  • Gods masterpiece, my inspiration

    The clouds sing of Your Glory mighty One The wind surf the mild waters of the ocean Nature is just one of  Your Great masterpiece The Earth is Your masterpiece She spins up the space like a speck of dust Which fall with the others when it is time The snow melts down into the…

  • When we age…

    Now when our face grow older And wrinkles come, Will you remember once this lively smile I wore? Will you remember how I made faces and winked at you? The ages came and went, the sun and her toil on us But will you remember the youth which we savored? When we walk faintly And…

  • Just by the Countryside

    Just by the countryside… Where only fields of green stay And where the mud mix with the clay Live the blue Clouds that smiled always And everything  here had something to say The trees tower over the fine little huts, Where the green forest sit upon the hills, With her inhabitants living with a firm…

  • The Traveler

    The traveler is like the sun Which traverse the length of the Earth And seen her peoples and foods and cultures The traveler is like a blast of the wind Which blow cold at times and hot The flying dust is a glad companion The traveler is like the compass Looking for the North pole…

  • The Shepherds Tale, another

    Night approached silently again And to the shepherd it was time to retire A time of his loneliness, a time of his daydreaming The Night  was the shepherds only companion She brought with her a galaxy and some fresh air And a bouquet of country music from the other locals When the shepherd laid down,…

  • Hospitality as Love

    Genesis 18.2 The world can only stand when we learn to love The culture and philosophy of live and let live Teaches us to live while letting others live Let the Eagle perch, let also the Kite perch None should forbid the other from perching The love we give returns to us in some other…

  • Amuse: Poetale of a town boy

    I have become the village belle Just that in fact, I am not a girl Nene was so good in eulogizing me She sang of my praises even when I did nothing She told the villagers about my escapades in the city She told them of my big eye glasses and how it fit my…

  • Note: Nature as an African

      Mother Nature is an African. I say this because I have seen why. Africa is unrivaled in wildlife species and variety. I have had an Ostrich tower over me back then in Ondo state of Nigeria and I have met the Hyena which could have passed for a demon with her red eyes and…

  • A far country

      On crossing the imaginary line in my minds eye I see a country far away, farther than the length of the earth Where the strong breezes of the ocean glide with the passing cloud And the waters are troubled each time the breezes came The dawn break high up the brown morning cloud And…

  • A muse: Heavy evening rain

      And now it rains with thunder The hand of Cold had come for her asunder, Come let us see the rains fall by the window Let us dance in the rain and have fun while we can Surely, the heavy rain has come to sow And her many seeds are spread across the land…

  • Smile for me African child

    Smile for me beautiful child Show me your joyful face Let me see your beautiful smile Come now, do not be shy Let me see your joy Let me see the little dimple And the lines of your face As they straighten up for a smile! Smile for me beautiful African child Do not mind…

  • The Storm is Over

    Continue in prayers -Colossians 4.2 Never lose hope when you see the storm come Never say never before before the day breaks For what seems to be the end might just be the start Of something fresh,  new and beautiful And after the cold winter comes the warm summer The clouds might leave the day…

  • It’s World Teacher Day

    Teachers create a civilization through their every day activities. Now by teachers I mean everybody who give out knowledge to others in any way or any form, not just the school teachers. I know someone out there will agree with me that teachers are awesome. I might not write a loving poetry to tell you…

  • African desire

    My land is green Africa, my Africa Together we win, My humble desire   Your arms are long like the bamboo weed The smoothness of the riverside air sooth it The hornet, the weavers all spread your seed And with joy, we come to you to inherit   Your moments are fun, beautiful, we are…

  • Loves Silhouette

    The evening came shyly The sun set before us And the end of the world We see fall below the hilltop The sweet airs wind traverse about They travel with grace Flirting with our hairs and cloth Now it is darker but can you see me? It is the sun set And she smile up…

  • Muse: Unabhangigkeit Nigeria!

    We are that patch of hope That grow like the jute rope And we are the sunlight, We are a mild climate We are the Cassava We are Enyimba We are the Jos Plateau Having mornings and dew, Evenings and the moonlight We are the bees and the locust We are a culture Of enterprise,…

  • Psalm: Father, I thank You

    Father I thank You I thank You for the airs come to me For the light and colors my eyes see I thank You for the noises of people I hear And the garments You gave me to wear The cloud wore a white garment The future we see is very bright The earth herself…

  • Waiting for the Rain

    We are baked in the sun While waiting for the rain, But now she remembered us The clouds has been moody and we knew she must surely cry now she wept, throwing rain water All over the little hamlet Now I claim the first drop And you claim the next drop Oh look up and…